


Hope is the thing with feathers

by antigrav_vector



Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Alternate Universe - Wings, First Meeting, Fluff, Get Together, Hurt Tony, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Romantic Soulmates, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Soulmates, Stony turns 10, Wingfic, Wings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-14
Updated: 2017-03-14
Packaged: 2018-10-02 19:18:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,735
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10225253
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/antigrav_vector/pseuds/antigrav_vector
Summary: When a person meets their soulmate, the tips of their feathers change color and glow but not before. Of course, it had to happen to Tony at the worst possible fucking moment and make his life that much more complicated.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Based on an [art prompt submitted by mid](http://mid-nighttiger.tumblr.com/post/157999832281/i-got-this-idea-in-my-head-and-it-wouldnt-go-away). I hope this does it justice.
> 
> Title borrowed from [a quote by Emily Dickinson](https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/e/emilydicki154102.html):  
>  _"Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul - and sings the tunes without the words - and never stops at all."_
> 
> With thanks to [Veldeia](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Veldeia) for beta.

The pull of the heavier prosthetic wing on his left side kept distracting him. Tony forced the sensation back out of his awareness as best he could. He needed to get the hell out before the rest of the Ten Rings' stockpile blew. If he was lucky, someone friendly would be watching the area and see the encampment go up. If not, he was in for a hell of a long trek through desert, and he might not survive it.

The cutting edge tech in his new wing was good, but not good enough that he could fly under his own power. It was simply too heavy. He'd done the best he could with the junk and scraps he'd been allowed to work with, but there was simply no way he could do more than glide unless he could improvise some kind of thruster.

He'd tried, and was pretty sure he'd succeeded, but the makeshift device had a very limited range, and he wanted to save it for an opportune moment. Using it, only to discover later that he'd wasted it was decidedly _not_ something he wanted to experience.

Tony wasn't sure whether it was five minutes or five months later that the low throb of beating wings carried to him on the low breeze that never seemed to stop blowing around here. The sound made him freeze, needing to know whether he would have to defend himself and use the single charge his thrusters had, or not.

Seeing Rhodey backwing hard and stumble to a stop in front of him had Tony questioning his own sanity. There was no way.

"Hey," he heard as arms went around him and a pair of familiar golden-brown wings shielded him from the sun, "next time you're sticking with me, alright? No more of these side trips."

Tony could only laugh, in response.

\------

[Four Years Later]

As he stared down a magic user who claimed to be a Norse god -- and apparently had the ability to create lifelike illusions -- with Captain America at his side, Tony had to wonder what in the hell his life had become. Both those things were scientific impossibilities, and no amount of rationalization was making any of this make sense.

It didn't make it less awesome or terrifying, either.

He'd rebuilt his prosthetic wing so that it was lighter and the movements more refined, and that had been a huge help in his self-assigned missions as Iron Man. But, the thing was, the armour made even more of a difference. It totally negated the weight of the prosthetic, and let him fly properly again, for all that it was the repulsor power sources he'd designed, rather than his own muscles, sending him skyward.

This guy, who was calling himself Loki and somehow evading most of the shots from his repulsors and Cap's shield, had rapidly discovered that he couldn't evade _all_ of them, and that the shots that landed were quite enough to disable him. The aerial support that the two SHIELD agents were providing helped as well, not that Tony was about to admit that out loud where either of them could hear it.

"So," Loki taunted him, his ridiculous golden helmet catching the light of his weird glowing staff, "your people saw fit to send two of its most broken little birds after me?"

Captain America -- Tony still wasn't over that -- growled at him. "Broken or not, we're going to take you down," he replied.

Loki sneered. "You're a man out of time, and your ally there is forced to rely on his mechanical crutch to claw his way into the air. I could send you back where you belong with little effort, and atomise your little friend's armour just as easily. I fail to see my disadvantage."

"Then why haven't you done it yet?" Rogers launched himself at Loki, shield first, and actually managed to catch the asshole in the face with the edge of the vibranium disc.

Tony had to grudgingly admire that little move. Whatever else you might say about the Capsicle, he obviously hadn't lost his fighting trim. Leveling his palm repulsors on their opponent, Tony fired. "My armour isn't a crutch, asshole," he hissed, knowing that the voice modulator would make the words sound appropriately harsh and angry.

The repulsor fire missed, but it gave the Cap another opening, and he didn't hesitate to take it.

In the end, it took them just over an hour to pin down the slippery bastard, but that was that. Loki surrendered, they cuffed him, and then they were en route back to the SHIELD helicarrier.

Of course the 'mission' couldn't simply end there. SHIELD, in the person of Director Fury, had ordered Loki's glowy blue stick confiscated, and asked Tony to figure out just what it did.

The Director had introduced him to one Dr. Bruce Banner -- full-time gamma ray expert and part-time rage monster -- in the process. Tony suspected that it was a move that was meant to be both incentive and distraction. After Natalie's stint as Pepper's PA and her actions after his (admittedly less than stellar) birthday party, Tony had no doubt she knew about his minor scientist's crush on the guy.

His lingering crush on Cap didn't matter. Not even now that it was beyond obvious that the man was somehow alive and well, but also the real original. And that he had somehow made it through to the future looking like he hadn't aged a day despite the effects of whatever had brought him through the intervening seventy years. It was kind of unfair that a nonagenarian could look that good.

Tony forced the thoughts back out of his mind, and tried to refocus on the task he'd been set.

"Got any updates for me, Banner?"

"Nothing worth mentioning. A few possible spikes on the spectrometer in interesting frequencies, but they've got roughly the same intensity as the noise."

"Can you filter the noise a little, or run the scan for longer?" Tony suggested.

"Mmm, I can try." Banner tuned him back out and turned to his screens again, changing parameters and implementing the suggestions on the spot.

Knowing he wouldn't get anything more out of the man for at least a few minutes, Tony left him to it.

His own thoughts turned back to the motives Fury might have for setting them this task. The only reason Tony was going along with this for the time being was the sure knowledge that understanding what Loki's glowy stick did would allow him to develop countermeasures. Well, okay, the knowledge that Fury would take advantage of the thing for his own agenda and so would Loki, if he could get it back, also played into his decision. But that was why he was running a hack to get into Fury's servers and figure out what the guy might want Loki's stick for.

A few hours passed quietly after that, until Cap came storming into the lab demanding to know what they thought they were doing. Tony said nothing about Banner's hasty retreat; the other scientist had quietly slipped out the door in Cap's wake, in what was clearly an avoidance tactic.

Raising an eyebrow at the captain, Tony bit back his initial angry response. It didn't work completely, but was enough to let him go with biting sarcasm instead. "What does it look like we're doing," he countered. "We're trying to figure out what this thing does."

"You're playing with fire, Stark," Rogers shot back, "and you're going to get burned. That thing looks way too much like the weapons I saw in the War."

Tony huffed at him. "Yeah? And just what can you tell me about those weapons besides the fact that they made things go boom? Anything? Got enough intel on them that I could figure out how to disable them? Without knowing what they did and how they did it, I can't counter them. The same goes for this staff of Loki's."

That made Rogers get right up in his face, bristling. Tony fought not to let the way the guy was puffing himself up be as intimidating as the guy intended it to be. "And are you prepared for the consequences if that thing 'goes boom' thanks to your experiments, Stark?" He demanded.

"More so than you, I'd think," Tony replied, starting to lose his own temper, now. "Back the fuck off."

"Oh, I'm starting to want you to make me."

"Yeah?" Tony laughed at the guy, which only seemed to make him madder. "You can either take me as is, which would make you the worst kind of asshole for beating up on a crippled man, or I can get the suit and kick your ass into next week."

Faster than Tony could blink, Cap had him by the collar and was lifting him off his feet. He struggled, wrapping his hands around Cap's bare wrists and doing his level best to get him to let go. It was a bit like trying to force a marble statue to move. Or attempting to bend a 2-inch diameter carbon steel rod with his bare hands.

Tony was so focused on getting free that he only realised what had happened when Cap dropped him as though he'd been scalded, seconds after he'd grabbed him.

"Stark," he managed, sounding utterly stunned, "what--"

Distracted by his attempts to catch his breath and rubbing at the back of his neck where his collar had cut into his skin, Tony glared at him. "Fuck you."

"Stark, be serious."

"Fuck you, you just tried to--"

A strong hand caught his chin and forced his head up. Tony fought it out of instinct, breaking off mid-sentence, but it was enough; he'd caught sight of the glow edging Rogers' feathers in a bright white so pure it looked almost silvery. That hadn't been there before.

"Holy shit."

He brought his good wing around, and, sure enough, there was a bright golden glow suddenly edging his own feathers. It was almost as blinding as Rogers'.

Tony swallowed hard around the sudden dryness of his mouth. "So, what now?"

Rogers glared at him. "I'm--" he paused and seemed to search for words. His expression softened a bit, taking on more than a hint of apology. "Are you alright?"

"I'm not hurt," Tony replied, "if that's what you mean. I'm sure as fuck not alright. This is... going to take some adjustment."

He was fucking soulmated to Captain America.

What the flying fuck, even.

Now that he was paying attention, he could feel a weird tugging sensation that seemed to be centered around Rogers. A bit like a gravitational pull, but centered behind his navel. And there was a weird fuzzy feeling at the back of his head, like someone was tickling the inside of his skull with the softest down underfeathers.

It was _bizarre_.

"Tell me about it," Rogers muttered.

And, just like that, their argument seemed to be over.

It took them another three days to find time to talk things over. Everybody on the helicarrier had known what had happened within an hour, naturally, and the rumours had flown thick and fast. Tony couldn't find it in him to care. He had bigger problems. Like figuring out what to tell Pepper. Well, that was his biggest concern until Loki got free and nearly dropped the helicarrier into the New York harbor.

By the time he, Rogers, Banner, Loki's brother Thor -- Tony still wasn't quite over that, either, because what the hell was his life turning into -- and the two SHIELD agents had gotten Loki back in custody and dealt with the invasion Loki had set on them, Tony had no fucks left to give about anything. He didn't have the energy.

Once SHIELD and Thor took over Loki's custody, he would have simply taken off for his Tower had Rogers not stopped him.

"Can I get a lift?" Cap asked, an exhausted rasp in his voice.

"To where?" Tony just knew he sounded as bad. If not worse. He ached, from the crown of his head to the soles of his feet, and was sure he'd have bruises for weeks after this fight.

"Wherever you're going."

Tony gave him a long level look, but Rogers never flinched or faltered. "Fine. Come here."

He took Rogers back to the Tower; it was his closest residence, even if it had taken some light damage during the battle, and he desperately wanted to get rid of his armour. It chafed horribly after the first ten hours or so, and no, he didn't want to think about why he knew that. The helipad and the suit removal gantry he'd installed were still intact, thankfully.

The consequence of that was that he ended up sprawled out on his livingroom sofa in his undersuit with Rogers uncertainly hovering over him, albeit metaphorically for now. Tony was pretty sure even Cap wouldn't be flying for a few days with the sore muscles he was sure to have gotten because of the fighting. And he really didn't like the way Cap was favoring his left side. It didn't seem to be an injury that required immediate attention, though, so Tony let it pass for the moment. 

Rogers tried to insist that they talk things out, immediately. Tried.

It didn't take long for it to become apparent that that wasn't going to happen. Tony insisted on eating first, and Rogers' stomach growled loudly at the mere mention of food. It had derailed his attempt handily. Cap had tried again afterwards, when they'd both stuffed themselves near to bursting with pizza and breadsticks. Tony had nodded off on the sofa between one sentence and the next. Albeit without meaning to.

Rogers made a third attempt after Tony woke. He got as far as insisting that Tony call him Steve before they got distracted.

Everything had been fine until Steve had absently taken Tony's hand as they tried to work out just what would need to happen and how. That had escalated quickly into a lot more touching, as their hands started wandering.

The feeling of connection that was running through him soon had Tony wanting more and harder, but Steve stopped him. He insisted that they stick to heavy petting, and making out. It hadn't even taken much effort on Steve's part to distract him, to Tony's chagrin -- a sentiment which he'd kept to himself, thanks.

He wasn't sure how he felt about it, but apparently being soulmated made you a sucker for things like being held and kissed senseless. That was also good, really, but Tony kind of desperately wanted to peel Steve's clothes right off him, and lick his way down that ridiculously muscled torso.

In the end, it took them two days to finish their talk, and Pepper interrupted them halfway through the morning of the second day. She stepped out of the elevator and started talking at Tony about things that needed to get done, on a personal and corporate level, as she walked through the foyer and the short hallway it connected to, assuming that he was going to simply nod along as usual.

On the whole, Tony would have been fine with that, and he was pretty sure Steve wouldn't have batted an eyelid over the scene. Pepper had a different approach, though. She walked into the mostly-intact living room and stopped short when she spotted them. 

"Tony Stark," she growled, having seen their soulmarks, "there had better be a good reason why you kept this from me for two days while the board and half the media outlets badgered me for any and everything I would give them."

Tony bit back a wince. "I was distracted?"

She lectured them both about _not telling her this had happened_ for approximately half an hour, and then seamlessly segued into asking Tony about the press release.

Somehow, despite the knowledge that the media were going to do their best to tear both of them to shreds, Tony couldn't seem to stop smiling. After all, he had Pepper at his side to keep the company running with her hyper competence, and now he had Steve at his back to support him.

Deciding he didn't give a damn what Fury thought, or what Fox News had to say, for that matter, was surprisingly easy after that.


End file.
